rastajenk
12-02-2009, 11:49 AM
Everybody has read or heard plenty about Republicans' problems: directionless, torn by Tea Partiers, leaderless, or worse, led by buffoons like Rush and Beck et al; and the accompanying advice for R's (usually unsolicited, from the lib side of the aisle) to compromise, move to the middle, grow the tent, and all that jazz. Some of it is accurate, most of it is baseless, but that's not the point.
The point is that it's not too soon for the Dems to do a little introspective navel gazing and wonder aloud if they're backing the right horses.
Suppose, and this isn't a real stretch by any means, that most of what the currently Chosen One touches turns to crap. Afghanistan in 18 months looks more like a cut and run than a mission accomplished. Health care reform bloats a new bureaucracy that neither rushes us into financial ruin nor does anything to improve the quality and quantity of health care. The economy slogs through a long, painful, jobless recovery. Some Wall St. suits go to jail, but most don't and big banking issues get kicked down the road. Bush-bashing gets less and less effective as a political strategy, and ownership of current problems gets forced upon the Obamatrons. ACORN, SEIU, and collective thuggery. And so on.
Usually the incumbent president is a mortal lock to be his party's candidate the next time, but I wonder if the Chosen One might get a primary challenge if his list of accomplishments is short. Can a Blue Dog steer them back to fiscal sanity? Can the Loony Fringe back someone who's even more liberal than Obama, if they feel he hasn't delivered enough? What kind of courage would it take to face off against the power of the bully pulpit, incumbency, and the Chicago way of political persuasion? Is it too daunting for any mere human to attempt? If The One starts to trend towards unelectability vs. the Repub choice, will there be anyone in the current landscape willing to step up and save them from Demselves?
Somebody (Bill Clinton maybe?) in the Dem leadership must have a Plan B hidden away in a lockbox in case The One starts looking like The One-Termer. I wonder who it is, and what it is.
The point is that it's not too soon for the Dems to do a little introspective navel gazing and wonder aloud if they're backing the right horses.
Suppose, and this isn't a real stretch by any means, that most of what the currently Chosen One touches turns to crap. Afghanistan in 18 months looks more like a cut and run than a mission accomplished. Health care reform bloats a new bureaucracy that neither rushes us into financial ruin nor does anything to improve the quality and quantity of health care. The economy slogs through a long, painful, jobless recovery. Some Wall St. suits go to jail, but most don't and big banking issues get kicked down the road. Bush-bashing gets less and less effective as a political strategy, and ownership of current problems gets forced upon the Obamatrons. ACORN, SEIU, and collective thuggery. And so on.
Usually the incumbent president is a mortal lock to be his party's candidate the next time, but I wonder if the Chosen One might get a primary challenge if his list of accomplishments is short. Can a Blue Dog steer them back to fiscal sanity? Can the Loony Fringe back someone who's even more liberal than Obama, if they feel he hasn't delivered enough? What kind of courage would it take to face off against the power of the bully pulpit, incumbency, and the Chicago way of political persuasion? Is it too daunting for any mere human to attempt? If The One starts to trend towards unelectability vs. the Repub choice, will there be anyone in the current landscape willing to step up and save them from Demselves?
Somebody (Bill Clinton maybe?) in the Dem leadership must have a Plan B hidden away in a lockbox in case The One starts looking like The One-Termer. I wonder who it is, and what it is.